When communicating remotely, businesses have relied on phone calls for over a century. However, today, it is becoming increasingly common to use services that do not rely on a phone number, such as Zoom, Slack, or Facebook Messenger.
Additionally, nearly everyone now has a smartphone. Therefore, when phone calls need to be made, it makes sense to use app-based calling services that take advantage of advanced features and avoid the limitations of conventional phone lines.
The bottom line is that modern businesses of all sizes need a digital telephony service that can send and receive calls from anywhere in the world on any device. It is also crucial for telephony services to fully integrate with CRM systems and other technology tools. Telephony services, like Zoho Voice, can fully virtualize calls while seamlessly integrating with other data systems.
What Is Zoho Voice?
Zoho Voice is a new online telephony platform that enables businesses to do away with old-fashioned landlines while taking full advantage of modern technology. The service gives businesses easy access to local and toll-free numbers. Calls made to these numbers can ring to any device.
Many of the limitations associated with traditional landlines and PBX systems have been eliminated with Zoho’s new service. For instance, you have agent-to-agent calling natively for Voice, so you can easily reach a colleague by dialing an extension in the Voice app. As a result of the smart features included with Voice, businesses can communicate with their customers more effectively while enjoying a wide range of new features that improve business performance.
International calling is crucial for doing business in the modern world, and Voice has responded to this requirement by offering cost-effective international calls. Companies can make calls to almost every country for only a few cents a minute. Additionally, purchase international phone numbers through Zoho’s telephony marketplace. Answer calls made to these numbers from anywhere in the world.
Voice Features
Voice offers the mix of features businesses of all sizes need to optimize the management of calls. Here are some of the key features:
Better Than a PBX
Voice completely eliminates the need to use complex call routing systems. With Voice, easily group team members together into call queues, so you can automatically route calls to the right place without investing enormous resources into an outdated enterprise PBX system. Easily modify settings for call routing from within Voice’s user-friendly online dashboard.
Smart Voice Response System
Voice does away with the clunky call menus of the past by enabling you to set up an interactive voice response system that greets customers when they place a call. This system uses AI and customer interactions to route customers to the right place with a high level of accuracy. If no staff members are available, automatically send calls to voicemail. Team members can easily access these voicemails from within Zoho’s online platform.
Get Control of Your Calls
Voice offers a range of features that can help businesses improve their customer service performance when calls are ongoing. An additional feature is recording calls for legal purposes or to hold customer service representatives accountable for call quality. Additionally, managers can view a live interface displaying the status of ongoing calls. You may also view a recent call log to see who is handling calls and the duration of each call.
Advanced Settings Made Easy
A wide range of advanced settings can help businesses to improve how their calls are handled. For instance, businesses can set business hours for each timezone and phone number. You can also set employees’ hours of availability. As a result, calls can always go to the right place while minimizing disruptions when associates are not available for calls. Tons of other advanced settings give your business full control over how calls are received, answered, and managed.
Intelligent Number Blocking
Number blocking is another important setting that Voice users can fully control. A representative can easily block a caller while a call is ongoing. Also, the smart AI system automatically can block spam calls. Voice subscribers can view a list of blocked callers, so managers can easily review and reverse blocks done by representatives.
Industry-Leading Integrations
Voice also works seamlessly with a wide range of other apps. In particular, Voice is designed to integrate with other Zoho products to easily extend your technology stack’s capabilities to meet your requirements. Overall, Zoho offers over 57 products and over a thousand extensions to give your business the precise range of technology features you require. As a result, businesses of all sizes can access the range of features they need at a price point they can afford.
Voice Pricing
Voice offers a competitive pricing model that aims to provide optimal value for businesses with any budget.
The entry-level plan supports one user and has no monthly service fees. However, to make calls, entry-level users have to buy a local number and pay for each minute of call time at the same rate that Zoho charges all of its customers.
A local U.S. number costs $1 per month, but international numbers can cost over $10 per month. Per-minute fees are set at the market rate and vary drastically between countries. Call costs range from less than $.01 a minute in the U.S. to up to $.05 a minute when calling major markets, such as France or Germany. Call almost any country in the world using Zoho Voice, but rates for some international calls can exceed $.10 per minute.
More advanced users might consider Zoho’s “Team” plan that costs $100 per month. The plan offers support for up to 10 users, free domestic incoming calls, and up to 1,000 minutes of free calls to the U.S., U.K., or Australia. More advanced plans can support hundreds of users at an advantageous price point.
Is Voice Right for Enterprise Businesses?
Although Zoho aims to make its products valuable to businesses of all sizes, the reality is that Voice is not yet ready to fully support large enterprise clients. There are dozens of major players in the enterprise segment that have been refining their services for decades. Even though the services of enterprise-focused PBX providers can be astronomically expensive, the reality is that these types of providers can be advantageous for large enterprises with over 5,000 employees.
In particular, Voice lacks full support for the specific infrastructures that large call centers need. One big one it is missing is an advanced CBX system that large call centers need. Though effective for large businesses with ordinary calling needs, companies that require extensive customization and adherence to call center standards are best with another solution.
Should Small Businesses Use Voice?
Voice is great at solving the needs of small and medium-sized businesses. Scale Voice to support teams with hundreds of users, and it provides all the calling functionality SMBs need at an affordable price point. Most importantly, Voice is reliable and easy to use, so there is no need to bring inexpensive customization and installation teams to get Voice working properly for your business. Instead, you can simply make an account and get started online in only a few minutes.
How could you improve how your business handles calls? Leave an answer to get advice from our Zoho consultants.
